On the Oregon it was considered bad luck to wish someone “good luck” before an operation, but Maurice had his subtle way of expressing his wish for a safe return.
“Thank you, Maurice. Looking forward to it.”
Maurice nodded and eased the door closed behind him. A few seconds later, the phone rang. It was Hali Kasim.
“Chairman, Murph spotted a cargo ship matching the Magellan Sun’s profile approaching on long-range radar thirty miles to the west.”
“ETA?”
“At their present speed, they’ll reach the coast in two hours. And I’ve got Langston Overholt on the vid line.”
“Okay, put him through to my cabin screen. And tell Linc and Eddie that I’ll meet them in the moon pool for mission prep as soon as I’m off the call.”
“Aye, Chairman.”
Juan hung up, and the moonlit waters of the Sulu Sea on the wall monitor were replaced by the giant face of Juan’s octogenarian mentor. Dressed in a tailored three-piece suit, the patrician career intelligence official with the shock of white hair sat behind a spartan but elegant desk. A copse of trees dappled by the morning sun was visible out the background windows, reminding Juan that his old mentor was twelve hours behind him.
Overholt looked just the same as he did the day he brought Juan into his group as a Foreign Service officer, and he seemed just as imposing up on the big screen.
“How’s it going out there, Juan?”
“Just about to go down and prep for the mission. Do you have any new info for us?”
“Well, we’ve got Dr. Ocampo and his friends squared away in a safe house outside Manila, where CIA officers are debriefing them. And through anonymous sources we’ve informed the Philippine National Police about the incident at the chemical lab. They’re scouring the crime scene as we speak.”
“I doubt they’ll find anything useful,” Juan said.
“That’s our assessment as well. Which is why we are giving you our support to go after Salvador Locsin. If Typhoon is as dangerous as Dr. Ocampo says it is, it could pose a clear and present danger to U.S. national security. In recent years, the Philippines remains one of our most important allies in the region to push back against Chinese expansion in the South China Sea. They’re even allowing us to base naval vessels there again. If Locsin were to threaten government stability, it might give China a blank check for taking over Taiwan and the rest of Southeast Asia.”
“Understood. Were you able to find any information about the Magellan Sun? Murph and Eric could only trace ownership to a Hong Kong shell corporation called Tai Fong Shipping and that it sails under the flag of the Marshall Islands.” Registering a cargo ship under a flag of convenience was common, and the Oregon herself often hoisted a Liberian, Panamanian, or Iranian flag on her jackstaff to maintain her anonymity.
Overholt shook his head. “Sorry. The only thing we can add to what you already know is that it was owned by the Chinese government before it was sold to Tai Fong.”
“Then we’ll have to assume everyone on board is a member of Locsin’s insurgency.”
“I think that would be wise.”
“In Ocampo’s debriefing, did he mention recalling anything about what they’re off-loading?”
Overholt picked up a piece of paper and scanned it. “He did remember a few words about parts for something they are manufacturing, and one word in particular stood out. Weapon.”
“It makes sense that the Chinese would be shipping weapons to them.”
“Or they’re building one.”
“You mentioned the U.S. naval base. They could be planning to attack it.”
“All the more reason to find out what Locsin is up to.”
“Then I’d better get moving.”
“One final thing before you go. Our meteorologists report that a tropical storm has formed to the east of the Philippines. They’re calling it Hidalgo. It’s headed your way, but it’ll be a few days before it arrives. However, they’re estimating that it’ll pick up strength by the time it makes landfall.”
Juan shook his head and gave Overholt a wry smile. “Typhoon Hidalgo?”
“Looks like it, my friend.”
27
MANILA
“This is a bad idea,” said Raven, who was at the wheel of a tiny rental car. Even at nine-thirty at night, traffic was chaotic, though not as thick as the daytime mess.
Beth didn’t look up from her phone. She was glued to the dot that intermittently appeared on the screen. “You said that already. Turn here.”
Since the bayside U.S. embassy was on the left, the only way to turn was right. “I wasn’t sure the ‘bad’ part had registered.”
Ten minutes ago, the tracking signal from the transmitter hidden on the eagle finial had suddenly come alive again right there in Manila. With Juan and the Oregon gone, they had no backup. After Beth’s brush with death the day before, Raven thought she might be hesitant to take more risks, but Beth was so intent on finding the paintings that she brushed off the risk. Raven had reluctantly given in, with Beth’s agreement that they would pull back at the slightest hint of danger.
“We’re not assaulting a fortress,” Beth said. “We’re just going to take a look. If it seems like a good chance that the paintings are at the location where we’re headed, we’ll wait and call in the cavalry. Consider this a first look. What do you call that in the military?”
“A reconnaissance mission.”
“Right. This is just one of those.”
“That’s what we were doing when we went to check out Ocampo’s chemical lab. I’d like to remind you it’s now a smoldering pile of ash.”
Beth flashed her a smile and gave her a thumbs-up. “You’ve done a great job so far. Keep up the good work.”
Raven just sighed in response. She could take care of herself. It was protecting someone else that was the tricky part, especially if they were intensely focused on another goal like Beth was. The pistol digging into her hip gave her some comfort, but the men they were facing weren’t like anything she’d come across before. She’d keep her head on a swivel in case this was a trap.
They drove another few blocks until Beth said, “The building on the left. We’re here.”
Raven stopped the car at an open space by the curb and stared up at a set of three luxury towers next to a brightly lit multistory structure, fronted by a semicircular drive with palm trees and manicured topiary. The sign on the front of the building read “Robinsons Place Manila.”
“This is a shopping mall.”
Beth looked up from her phone at the multiple advertisements for stores and restaurants inside. “Oh, yeah. That’s weird.”
“You sure this is it?” Raven had been expecting to be directed to some run-down industrial area where an ambush would be easy to execute.
Beth checked the phone again and nodded. “The signal keeps popping up every minute or so inside this building.”
“Not in one of the towers?” An apartment would have been a more likely place for it to be but impossible to check without careful planning.
Beth, exasperated, shoved the screen toward her. Raven pursed her lips when she saw the dot in the center of the mall.
“Let’s go,” she said, putting the car in park. “Stay close to me.” She opened the door and stood, scanning the street around them. Couples going to the movies, groups of teens out on the town, and families coming home from a late dinner crowded the streets. No one seemed to be paying particular attention to them, so Raven motioned for Beth to come with her.
Beth joined Raven as she crossed the street. “I think you meant to say, ‘You’re right, Beth. How could I have doubted you?’” Raven scowled at her. “Because this doesn’t seem right.”
“Why not?”
“Why would the signal be dead for days and then suddenly reappear in the middle of a
Manila shopping mall?”
“I don’t know. That’s what we’re here to find out.”
The unknown was the worst enemy for someone on a protective detail. Raven didn’t know the layout of the mall, and there was no explanation for the abrupt renewal of the signal. She would have called this off if she didn’t think Beth would have gone in anyway. At least they were in a public location full of witnesses.
Once they were inside, Raven was happy to see that the upscale mall wasn’t quite as packed as it would have been during the day. It would be easier to spot anyone who looked out of place.
The four-story-tall central atrium was awash in light, its pristine white walls complementing the stone floor’s colorful rectangular pattern. Raven guided them to a bank of escalators. She wanted the advantage of height.
When they reached the top level, they had an expansive view of the atrium, and they also had multiple escape options if it came to that, Raven having already identified several emergency stairways.
“Where exactly was the signal?”
“Juan told me it’s only accurate to fifty feet,” Beth said, “but the last time it was activated, it was coming from somewhere in this atrium.”
They looked down at the many clusters of chairs that had been placed there for the convenience of weary shoppers. In one cluster, a couple of dazed parents watched their toddlers running around in circles. In another, college-age kids were laughing and fiddling with their phones. Some isolated patrons were even napping on the seats.
In all the groups, one man stood out. He sat alone in a corner cluster of chairs, alert, and watching each passing customer as if he were a leopard sizing up which prey was worth taking down. His suit couldn’t hide the muscular build that Raven had noticed in the rest of Locsin’s men, and his bald head reflected the lights like a shiny Christmas ornament.
She nudged Beth and nodded to the man.
“Is that him?” Beth wondered.
“Does he look like he’s shopping for bath towels?”
“It looks like he’s waiting for someone. You think he’s expecting us to show up?”
“I don’t know,” Raven said. “We’ll keep an eye on him, but let’s get some cover by that pillar in case he glances up this way.”
They sidled over to the pillar and leaned against it so that only a small portion of them was visible from the main floor below. While Beth was focused on the man downstairs, Raven kept checking the people approaching them from either side. She felt so exposed that the back of her neck itched.
Beth patted her on the shoulder and urgently pointed at the man. He had shifted in his seat, and now a metal case was exposed behind his legs.
“He’s got the same case Tagaan had in Bangkok,” Beth said, barely able to contain her excitement. “The eagle finial from the Gardner Museum must be inside. That explains why we’re not getting a signal right now.”
“Maybe” was all Raven said.
A minute later, the man picked up the case and opened it for a brief moment. Beth checked her phone and said, “I’ve got the signal. The finial is still in there. What do we do now?”
“We wait to see what he does.”
“If he leaves, we have to follow him. He might not open the case again, once he goes, and then we’ll lose our lead.”
Beth was right about that, but Raven knew following him was a big risk. If they were spotted, Raven would have to work fast to get away. And Beth would just slow her down. Not to mention Beth’s scarlet hair, which would make tailing the man undetected even more difficult.
“If he leaves, I’ll follow him on my own,” Raven said.
“Oh no you’re not,” Beth protested. “I’m not letting him out of my sight.”
“You’re not trained for this. I am. No offense, but you’ll be a liability.”
“Offense taken.”
Raven gestured at the people passing them. “You might have noticed there aren’t a lot of tall redheads in this country. He’d make you about ten seconds after we started after him. Then they could set an ambush without us even realizing it.”
“But I—”
“Let me do my job. Like you said, it’s just reconnaissance.”
Beth opened her mouth, then closed it again in a huff.
“I think you meant to say, ‘You’re right, Raven.’”
“Whatever,” Beth said with a smirk. “Hey, who’s that?”
A second man, this one dressed in a casual shirt and jeans, approached the man in the suit, who stood and shook hands with him. They both sat down, and the man who’d been waiting opened the case.
He withdrew the finial that Raven had seen in Bangkok, its gilt finish flashing in the lights. Beth held her breath when the second man took it and began an examination, turning it over in his hands and checking every surface.
He turned it over and looked intently into the base, where Beth had placed the tracker chip. Beth grabbed Raven’s arm.
“He’s going to find it!”
Beth’s fear came true when the man reached his fingers into the hole and drew something out that he held between his thumb and forefinger. It was too small to see from this distance, but it had to be the tracker.
The man stood and raged at the other man, jabbing the tiny object toward his face. The two of them argued so loudly that some of the other patrons began staring at the scene. After a few moments, the two of them suddenly stopped fighting and looked around the atrium as if they were about to be surrounded by unseen forces.
The man in the casual shirt flicked the tracker away like a used cigarette, jammed the finial into the suited man’s gut, and took off, sprinting for the main entrance. The man in the suit put the finial back in the case and walked quickly in the opposite direction.
“Stay by your phone,” Raven said, getting ready to make a break for the stairs, when Beth pulled on her arm.
“Oh, no,” Beth said. “He’s throwing it away!”
Sure enough, the man in the suit strode right to a trash can and stuffed the case inside as if he feared that there was another tracker somewhere in the case and didn’t want to risk being followed. He walked away without looking back.
Before Raven could stop her, Beth ran for the escalators. Raven called behind her to wait, but Beth had a head start, and with a runner’s physique and long legs, she was able to maintain a distance between them. Nobody else seemed to be running after them.
When they reached the main floor, Beth got to the trash receptacle a few steps before Raven.
“No, don’t!” Raven yelled. She couldn’t shake the feeling that all of this was wrong.
Despite her plea, Beth opened the case anyway, eager to make sure the finial was still intact. Raven couldn’t see what was inside, but when she saw the horrified expression on Beth’s face, she knew the whole thing had been a setup.
Beth turned the open case toward her, and Raven could now see a display that read ARMED and a small block of C-4 explosive next to the finial. There was also a small radio inside.
It crackled to life, and a voice said, “Do exactly what I say or the case will explode. If either of you tries to run away, you’ll die before you get two steps from it. Look toward the entrance.”
Beth looked past Raven’s shoulder, and her face went so white that Raven was afraid she might pass out, holding a bomb in her hands. Raven turned slowly, angry with herself about being duped but already running through ideas about how they were going to get out of this situation.
She already knew who she’d see, but she still felt a deep chill when she spotted him standing by the main entrance with a wicked grin on his face. Flanked by four of his imposing soldiers, and crooking a finger for them to come toward him, was Salvador Locsin.
28
MANILA
Finding an isolated location in the bustle of the city would have been difficult
, so Gerhard Brekker rented a yacht big enough for his team and docked it away from the main marina so that Alastair Lynch’s periodic screams for more Typhoon would go unheard. The 60-foot power cruiser with sleeping quarters for ten passengers reminded Brekker of the fishing charter his father owned in his home city of Cape Town.
After getting Lynch squared away on the boat, he and Van Der Waal had spent the day casing the Baylon Fire factory and warehouse, where Lynch claimed the smuggling operation was based. Lynch had divulged how the drugs were packed into fire trucks for shipment, and he knew one was supposed to be loaded by this evening and shipped out the next day. Brekker’s target was Locsin himself. It was easy enough to find the rebel leader’s photo on websites advertising the bounty put on his head by the Filipino government.
The facility was surrounded by a chain-link fence topped by razor wire, and access was controlled by a gate with two guards, posted twenty-four hours a day. Getting in unseen wouldn’t pose much of a problem. Brekker had planted minuscule cameras on light poles, with views of the plant from six different angles, including the guard gate, to allow remote observation. They relayed the images via a phone hidden under what looked like a discarded box on the side of the road. The setup would give them twenty-four hours of surveillance before the batteries died.
The plan was to sneak into the warehouse in the middle of the night and steal the fire truck filled with the smuggled methamphetamine. Then he would have a powerful bargaining chip for reeling in Locsin.
While he waited for Greg Polten and his colleague, Charles Davis, to arrive, Brekker munched on a sandwich and watched feed from the cameras on three monitors set up in the cruiser’s luxurious main dining area. Van Der Waal sat on the other side and drew the curtains before cleaning and oiling his trusty Vektor SP1 pistol, the standard sidearm for South Africa’s Defence Force. Lynch was in a cabin below with one of Brekker’s men watching him while the others got some shut-eye in the bedrooms. Equipment bags were piled on the marble floor along with several fifty-pound kettlebell weights to keep the mercenaries fit during extended ops, though they often proved handy for other purposes as well.